The dumb jocks who elect Michigan governors aren’t happy with current nerd governor Rick Snyder just because he signed a Right To Work bill into law basically before the damn thing was written and otherwise sat on his thumbs as the state legislature conducted a lame duck session so radical that it made Robespierre’s Committee of Public Safety look sane and deliberate in comparison.

Just a month ago, Snyder was pretty popular with voters. He had a 47% approval rate (with just 37% disapproving) because people thought he was the one Republican governor that wasn’t hell bent on turning his state into Franco’s Spain. Then everyone learned that Snyder and his legislative cronies actually think Franco was a good guy who just didn’t go far enough.

Snyder, finished with his Right To Work quickie, is currently pondering whether or not to sign bills to allow guns in schools(he vetoed that one), authorize a wolf hunt, create abortion provider regulations just to be dicks, cut business taxes (again), limit the state’s voter-approved medical marijuana law, and reinstate an emergency manager law voters just overturned that will create “more and better jobs.” In the meantime, Public Policy Polling says Michiganders are pretty much ready to replace the nerd with whatever hapless Democrat runs against him. And they will be hapless. Have you seen Michigan’s Democratic Party? It’s nothing but hapless. Plus Carl Levin, who can be awesome at times.

Snyder trails every Democrat we tested against him in a hypothetical match up. He’s down 49/38 to 2010 opponent Virg Bernero, 47/39 to Congressman Gary Peters, 46/38 to State Senator Gretchen Whitmer, and 44/39 to former Congressman Mark Schauer. The Bernero numbers are what’s most striking there.

Snyder beat on Bernero like a rented mule in 2010 because, other than the seven people who enjoy watching Virg get all shouty on MSNBC’s Ed Show, even liberals can’t stand Virg Bernero. Compared to the Rick Snyder of the last month, however, Virg looks like John freaking Adams.

He's a one lick hick guitar player. But, you're right, his overcompensating-killing fetish that can't quite mask the memory of purposeful shit in his pants is the worst thing about him.

freakishlywrong

I guess I still can't comprehend that very nearly half this country is jaw droppingly ignorant. This asshole has lied, rammed through unpopular legislation and has used fascist tactics and governing that people HATE. And still manages to come it at almost 40%??? Jesus, people.

BerkeleyBear

Blago got re-elected (pre-indictment) despite only 38 percent approval, and actually had a higher approval rating than that as he was being impeached. Partisan affiliation is a nice opiate, allowing one to ignore all critical thinking.

GhostBuggy

And Grand Rapids.

BerkeleyBear

You mean Grand Rapids exurban environs (Portage, Grand Haven, Muskegan, Holland, all points in between). GR proper is more of a mixed bag, largely because of the blahs.

GhostBuggy

Yeah, I was using it as a catch all for the west coast area. Certainly GR city is as you described.

Negropolis

Grand Rapids proper is still unusually purple for a city in Michigan, thouogh.

BerkeleyBear

Yeah, but when you think of it as a firewall for the insane Dutch Calvinists to the West and North of there it makes a lot more sense (my relatives in Portage being some of the Dems that try to make a fight out of it)

Lyin', cheatin', and stealin' to support the Kock Konstituency. Goo' boy.

snowpointsecret

The Eddie Guerrero of the Repubican Party.

WhatTheHolyHeck

His widow is running the show?

snowpointsecret

2014 will be fun at this rate.

miss_grundy

Tell me about it, Wonkette! I'm stuck here in Michigan. I don't have a job and money, so I can't leave the state. God forfend, that Snyder (#onetoughnerd) should have the cojones to actually tell the Republican miscreants to give him a jobs bill to sign. No, these asshats would rather limit women's reproductive rights and strike down collective bargaining, and race down to the basement imitating Indiana. I didn't vote for this asshat, perhaps that should be a bumper sticker on my car.

snowpointsecret

Michigan trying to be Indiana? Does Ohio need to build a fence, because even Kasich isn't this bad. I'll still be happy to get rid of him though, does anyone want him?

noodlesalad

At least you can take comfort in your just-right trees.

eggsacklywright

So Snyder is a Franco-American? Huh.

http://wonkette.com/ weejee

Spaghetti-Uhohs?

memzilla

With One Large Meatball.

Oblios_Cap

That's not real meat.

eggsacklywright

Pink slime prolly.

BaldarTFlagass

Probably not real tomato sauce, either.

christianmuslin

Michigan, is it on the Boener list to sell to Canada to reduce the deficit?

GhostBuggy

As a Michigan resident, I support this plan.

Negropolis

God, I sure hope so.

calliecallie

Canada is looking more attractive to me every day. Let's do it!

memzilla

Create a Federal program to hire unemployed Michiganders to either raze the 90,000 abandoned buildings in Detroit and create truck farms, or turn Detroit into a Bladerunner-themed paintball arena.

I have long thought perhaps it should get the same kind of treatment as New York or LA in those Kurt Russell "Escape from…" movies.

docterry6973

I think we can count on the GOP to go full-on crazy in the next two years, in an insane attempt to do everything that the Koch brothers demand, in case the mid-terms don't go well.

I predict every Obama state with a GOP legislature will apportion its electoral votes according to the gerrymandered congressional districts, thereby guaranteeing he election of a president with a minority of the popular vote in 2016 and 2020. So that will be nice.

memzilla

… Michiganders are pretty much ready to replace the nerd with whatever hapless Democrat runs against him.

Inanimate Carbon Rod For Governor. Green, Rested, and Ready!

noodlesalad

The GOP tactic of slash and burn governing (burn the state to the ground, let the Dems come in and regrow everything, then get re-elected and do the same damn thing over again) is almost as unforgivable as the media's constant enabling of these tactics.

sewollef

Well, as you know, they will have to destroy it in order to save it.Lt. Calley, Professor Emeritus,University of Whatthefuckiswrongwiththesepeople

http://wonkette.com/ weejee

Will zombie George Rmoney be running? A gnash-rambler moment, perhaps?

BaldarTFlagass

Beep beep, beep beep, his state went beep beep beep.

TootsStansbury

Franco! Welk Fucking done!

eggsacklywright

I've heard about those randy whelks.

TootsStansbury

Heehee oops. I don't think I can blame that on autocorrect either.

eggsacklywright

"Wunnerful, wunnerful…turn on the bubble machine."

thatsitfortheother1

"Thank you boyz."

BaldarTFlagass

Maybe Alvin Green should consider moving to Michigan.

HistoriCat

Alvin Green moves by not moving.

Lot_49

Renowned Michigander Ted Nugent needs to contribute his thoughtful insights to this dialogue.

thatsitfortheother1

Or at least a deer carcass or something.

shelwood46

Since he's going to be dead or in jail by April, he really should speak up soon.

Negropolis

Hey, he's Texas' problem, now.

HistoriCat

Like Texas needed another gaping asshole.

BaldarTFlagass

"emergency manager law"

They should bring that back, because Michigan needs more Gauleiters.

Oblios_Cap

The GOP in MI will probably pass bills privatizing the prisons and making being unemployed a felony, arresting as many people as possible before the next election. That way the prison industry makes a pile of money and most Michigan voters will be convicted felons and unable to vote.

Everybody wins! Problem solved.

TootsStansbury

Hush you, don't give them any ideas.

cousinitt

Franco is still dead, right?

http://facethesuncastnoshadow.wordpress.com/ Mumbletypeg

That's a veritable litany of offenses Snyder is balancing his wobbly reputation on.
I like to say we are each more than the sum of our parts, except when the person is a sumbitch, whose door to responsible governing shuts whenever his window for selfish opportunity opens.

BaldarTFlagass

Bob Seger should run. He's pretty solid, like a rock.

Oblios_Cap

He should be down on Main Street.

BaldarTFlagass

And the Michiganders could turn the page.

Chichikovovich

And send Snyder to Katmandu.

Chichikovovich

Yeah, but he'd be running against the wind.

thatsitfortheother1

Out past the cornfields where the woods got heavy.

Chichikovovich

Workin' on mysteries without any clues.—

Lot_49

"Lansing Lights" just doesn't have the same ring.

GhostBuggy

His night moves likely won't involve passing insane bills in the middle of the night.

Goonemeritus

Let’s take up a collection to help Dennis Kucinich move to Michigan. With him out of Congress we will have fewer opportunities to see his hot wife out and about, and we need someone out there focused on the UFO threat

eggsacklywright

True, we have not seen enough of hotwife.

Lot_49

Wasn't he going to move to Oregon to take on Big Wood (the lumber industry)?

southernboyman

Ricky boy is a not so smart ALEC….

Oblios_Cap

Why did they elect Snyder in the first place? Was Lepetomane unavailable?

BaldarTFlagass

They thought they would get free pretzels.

Negropolis

Because he ran as a Mr. Fix it independent Republican after eight tough economic years under an unpopular Dem governor. It was really just natural turnover kind of like how Minnesota elected a Dem after a Republican, that year, and Ohio tossed their Dem governor. It didn't help it was the peak of th Red Wave.

thatsitfortheother1

the peak of th Red Wave.

Is that monthly?

http://tonguepunch.insanejournal.com/ Andrew Drinker

Who the fuck names their child "Virg"?

Negropolis

It's short for Virgil, and his father is an Italian immigrant and his mother is a second generation Italian American.

http://tonguepunch.insanejournal.com/ Andrew Drinker

There you go again getting all matter-of-facty on me!

thatsitfortheother1

Guys named Stu.

eggsacklywright

I have no beef with that.

LesBontemps

"One tough nerd?" More like one moronic douchenozzle.

LibertyLover

Two years to the election of Governor of Michigan? Pssshawww. That's a lifetime in politics. Heck, that is several lifetimes. Will voters remember by then?

GhostBuggy

This is my concern. It's odd to contemplate now that people may forget the massive demonstrations and the dickbags' in the state legislature corrupt way of conducting business…but two years is two years.

calliecallie

I am confident that the Republicans will continue to do stupid mean stuff to remind us of this moment right up until the next election.

FakaktaSouth

I love the Right to Work Act – being as blatantly Orwellian as the Clear Skies Initiative with all the thuggery of "you wanna work or you want rights? you can't have both and it would be a shame to see anything happen to that shitty job you barely have there." Why would the people of Michigan NOT love that it was also enacted in the most corrupt possible way? Fabulous trifecta of fuckery.

I was all in a tizzy to find that my P-ness measurement hit 100 today!

Then I found out it's in millimeters.

Veritas78

'sokay—more room to grow. If you know what I mean and I think you do.

Negropolis

I ccan stand my mayor being governor. In fact, it'd be nice if we had one crazy Dem in a governorship just to begin to balance out ALL of the crazy tea party guvs. Plus, there is not enough f-bombs in American politics, and Virg drops 'em like he's flying over Dresden.

thatsitfortheother1

Flaming f-bombs?

Negropolis

Molotov f-bombs, 'cause he's practically a socialist in his rhetoric.

eggsacklywright

W. G. Sebald libel!

DahBoner

Michigan: Hillbillies with New-car payments.

OK, it's usually a payment on a Caddy or Mercedes SUV, but still stoopid….

PuckStopsHere

I KNEW this guy, this One Tough Nerd, was really One Miserable Fuck. I knew it. I tried to warn others but they said, "Oh, but that Virg Bernaro is so MEAN and ANGRY." You know what? Take a walk (actually you better make that a ride, some of these places are not safe enough for a walk) through parts of Detroit, or Flint or the City where Virg is mayor, Lansing, and if you don't get angry yourself you are doing it wrong. Virg sees his as a city one-third (and probably more) of which is ill-feed, ill-housed and ill-clothed and for some reason, here in the richest country in the world, that makes him mad, That should have gotten him more votes, not less. And so many of us stayed home in 2010. And we think we are the smart ones…

Negropolis

I was embarrassed for Michigan that so many so-called Dems didn't even give Virg a chance. The media completely ignored him. In a state with such a proud labor tradition, it was sickening to see the media blackout for the guy calling Wall Street to account with the harhest of language.

Sometimes when John the Baptist comes running out of the woods screaming his goddamned head off, you should probably at least listen.

Yeah, I'm bitter. The state that gave this country the modern middle class, and they didn't even give the guy a proper inspection and hearing. If only we would have all been so mad and not willing to take it anymore. The cross-over fools only have themselves to blame, because Virg wasn't a bad candidate, and it showed in how scared Snyder was of him by giving him only one debate.

mavenmaven

Sounds like the GOP might have another mission for Alvin Green coming up…

http://zvibleindmeis.tumblr.com/ Spurning Beer

It is my hope for 2013 that Michigan Democrats will become hapful.

bikerlaureate

If the past couple weeks don't spur that result, one wonders if it's still possible…

lout_hammer

Loudest message by far; hundreds of demonstrators in the capitol building wearing
wooden "Dutch" clogs and dancing to "Ain't it Great"…